With the usual suspects rallying -- gold and oil -- it's important to remember how the oil rallies have unfolded in the past. You have to be able to recall the oil pecking order of the petroleum complex ramp.
First to move in the drilling complex is Transocean (RIG) (Cramer's Take), the wildest trader in the group. Then it is National Oilwell Varco (NOV) (Cramer's Take). Forget that both of these are the least affected by the day-to-day price of oil. The market's real stupid on these oil moves, and that's what happens. On the oil side it is Occidental (OXY) (Cramer's Take), which at least is closely correlated and can have a big move throughout the day.
On the natural gas side it is Apache (APA) (Cramer's Take) and then Anadarko (APC) (Cramer's Take). Southwestern (SWN) (Cramer's Take) can jump too. The key thing is to have all of these on your screen, ready to see which doesn't jump too much so it can catch up to the others in the rally. There's always one with some brain-dead supply carried over from yesterday.
It seems like it has been ages that we have had any rally in these but the patterns are well established.
ETF lovers, your next move might be in the Oil Services HOLDRS (OIH) (Cramer's Take). From the looks of things the smart money was betting on a drop to $115 from the $117 level. If we don't get that, I think the better play is the near-term -- this week -- 115 calls, although I expect those to be capped at $120. If we blow through $120, where there are a lot of short calls, it could be explosive.
These rallies tend to be magnified by options expiration and they can also be defeated by heavy selling in the OIH. Monitor both, but be prepared to reap some short-term gains.
Random musings: A little ludicrous behavior in Nasdaq futures. Many of the big dogs are trapped by strikes, Intel (INTC) (Cramer's Take) and Microsoft (MSFT) (Cramer's Take) in particular. Apple (AAPL) (Cramer's Take) usually swoons to a low strike and then ramps. I thought that happened Monday, but sellers came back into the market. I think Google (GOOG) (Cramer's Take) has the best chance to romp and the best quarter ahead.
Jim Cramer is co-founder and chairman of TheStreet.com. He contributes daily market commentary for TheStreet.com's sites and serves as an adviser to the company's CEO. At the time of publication, Cramer had no positions in the stocks mentioned.
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